24th Nov, 2023
“Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people.”
To be specific, these small minds are fault-finders, which according to the Webster dictionary, are people who habitually find fault, complain, or object, especially in a petty way.
As a part of human nature, we subconsciously search for faults in other people to feel better about ourselves, or just because their faults are annoying to us.
Put simply, fault-finders are people who obsessively find fault in others and criticize. They often complain and harshly judge others based on trivial issues. Fault-finders are constantly telling others what they are doing wrong and or what they should be doing. They rarely, if ever, let a fault slip by, regardless of how insignificant.
Once, A famous painter had thousands of fans who would never get tired of praising his work.
One day, he thought “Do people praise only in front of me & talk about mistakes behind my back?”
The next day, he put up his painting at a busy intersection of the city & wrote a note “If you find a mistake in my painting, please put a mark in that place.”
In the evening, when he went to the square, there were hundreds of marks on his painting. Seeing this, he got very disappointed & stopped painting thereafter.
When one of the painter’s friends heard this, he said, “Let’s put a painting made by you at that intersection again but this time with a different note.”
The next day, a new painting was put at the intersection. Now the note read, “If you find a mistake in my painting, please correct it.”
In the evening when the painter went to check the painting, it was still the same & there were no corrections made.
His friend said, “Anyone can find mistakes but there are very few who help to correct those mistakes. There is no point in unnecessarily taking opinions of people who only find fault without suggesting improvements.”
My guiding thought about fault finding has always been a quote from Marcus Aurelius, ” Whenever you are about to find fault with someone, ask yourself the following question: What fault of mine most nearly resembles the one I am about to criticize?”
Let’s stop finding faults and make a serious attempt towto become example of one who focuses less on the bad, and more on the good & stay blessed forever.